Defining Futures
by Team Alpha Wolf Lightning
Summary: In Smallville Lois goes to the future this is what would have happened in my future if Bruce was in it. The sun has turned red so Bruce Wayne (17) comes back to help Clark and save the world they live in.


**Bruce is 17 Clark is 21. Enjoy.**

Eight years ago Bruce Wayne had been killed by a street thug. At nine all things had seemed possible even in a place like Gotham. He believed that he could do anything and why not? His parents had defied the odds of their social classes to pursue their life ambitions. His father became a surgeon, one who was admired by all for actually doing something besides spending his money. He gained the respect of his peers and those on the streets that came to his surgery in the lower town for help. He denied no one anything and for that he was considered an eccentric. His mother was responsible for the handling of the Wayne money and spent it lavishing her son and her city in riches. She held balls and galas to fundraise for orphans and housing projects and would often be seen helping out at some of the manual projects that the Waynes sponsored proving that it wasn't enough to spend the money, you had to get involved with them as well.

But all that stopped when he was nine, everything that he could have been vanished at the approach of a street thug. The affair was cold and impersonal as he laid waste to the family. Shooting the parents after taking their money and destroying the life of a young boy. After that there was no more Thomas, Martha or even Bruce Wayne. All of them had been sent off in that alley with no hope of redeeming them.

Bruce believed all that to be true, he wasn't the same boy that played happily in the manor gardens. The blood that stained the concrete beneath his small body had soaked itself and destroyed anything that was weak inside of him and moulded him into opportunist he was today.

Now at seventeen he had spent two years of his life travelling the world and learning the ways of the deprived and dangerous. His limbs had been transformed into a killing machine but his mind was what he truly sought to strengthen with his journey. He had sought out ways to overcome his fear in order to seek out and destroy his last demon that dined on the glories of Gotham's underbelly.

His last stop was that of a small temple in the eastern Chinese mountains, he only went there because there was a man who could teach him how to separate a narcotics influence on the human brain and eliminate the effects without need of an antidote or the effects to wear off. The teacher was reclusive but happily accepted Bruce after he presented his previous masters reference and they worked day and night to produce a state of mind within Bruce that would starve off narcotics.

He was two weeks in when things changed. Bruce had always believed until that moment that the first man he would kill would be the street mugger that had destroyed his life but when the sky turned red it seemed inevitable that Bruce wouldn't get to fulfil that promise.

Something was wrong with the sun, the yellowy glow that had pervaded the sky had darkened to a blood red. The blue and white of the clouds soaked up the red and turned grey and orange so much so that it sometimes hurt to look at the sky. The red seemed to not only affect the earth in colour. After three days of wandering around the temple Bruce could feel himself become fatigued easily. The atmosphere was heavier and began to scorch the skin if you stayed out too long. The gravity of the earth had also increased as he could feel himself easily wanting to sit down constantly through the day. Bruce hoped that the peak of the red sun wouldn't start killing humans the longer it stayed. But with that thought things started to come together.

The sun and atmosphere had made him slow. Bruce growled to himself before determinately striding back towards his room he grew more confident in his movement the more he thought and pushed his mind into the forethought of his body's movement. He wouldn't succumb to the heaviness of the earth so long as he willed it and his mind was more willing than ever to sort out what has happened.

There was only one conclusion that Bruce could come up with as he shut his out the rest of the temple. This was Clarks' doing, he didn't know how or why but it definitely had something to do with him. The heavier atmosphere would appear normal to one that could defy the laws of gravity and would reverse his powers to that of a powerless being. Clark would be vulnerable for the first time ever.

"So then they're his enemies. But what would they have to gain by making him powerless when they themselves would be lethargic and weaker also," Bruce contemplated to himself. He thought of all the meteor infected in Smallville and guessed that it could be one of their doing but again the restoration of the red sun would mean that the meteor rocks and all those infected would return to their previous normal state. Bruce began thinking about other beings that could potentially wish to do this when a boom sounded from outside. "Looks like I've found my answer," he spoke to no one before following the rest of the temple's inhabitants to the source of the noise.

What greeted them was a man, slim in stature but his hovering state showed that he possessed more power than he appeared. Bruce frowned at the man, he was of the same origin as Clark that much was for certain in the way his skin seemed flawless and his defeat of gravity being the same as Clark's was. Yet the fact that he was doing so on a planet that should at this time null his powers was disconcerting.

"Terrans." He spoke "I am your new leader acting on behalf of our great General Zod. As his first decree has stated you will all go to the main city and be catalogued, but fear not, this isn't a measure of dictatorship merely a way of him greeting all his new citizens and making sure that none of you are left in the dark of your new leadership." He smiled but it was one of forced contempt not kindness and Bruce could tell along with most of the people there that he was saying the cataloguing was a way of counting how much stock they had.

A truck appeared soon after he had spoken with armed men coming out of it and opening the back. Soon more followed and when the first commands came for them to get in the vehicles it wasn't a surprise that the temple took on a defensive measure.

Bruce knew that the effort was pointless and willingly ran towards one of the trucks whilst weapons were being hauled out of vaults. He didn't come to their aid as the armed men gunned down those who were foolish enough to try and take the trucks for themselves. He turned away when the alien let loose his heat vision and vaporised the rest of the temple. No one had thought it best to retreat and come up with a plan when they got to the city so Bruce sat alone as the men cleaned up the scraps of the vaporised temple and took what little treasure they could find back to their trucks.

The ride there was long and the alien had flown ahead of them no doubt to find other temples to recruit for the cataloguing. He soon grew a bit sick when he let himself think of the people who had just perished but snapped back into a focused mode. It wouldn't do for his emotions to take charge or he would soon be short of breath from sitting like most of the armed men that were slouched over in their seats next to Bruce. instead he focused on the problem at hand. The man said he was the new leader but he also answered to someone that spoke of more than one of these aliens being here. Each of them must have gotten their own sector and Bruce didn't know if it was comforting or not that there was only one ruler and not two of them for this sector. It meant that there was enough for all the world but not enough that they needed to team up. It didn't matter though, Bruce had spent only three weeks getting to know Clark and he knew that save meteor rocks he was virtually indestructible. Now that the rocks were null there was nothing to stop them.

But there had to be. Bruce spent the rest of the journey trying to figure out a way to take them down but after five hours they were there and he still had nothing.

They had brought Bruce to a shiny silver building where streams of people were lined up. The guards led him to one of the lines which he assumed was for people under the age of twenty since he had a fourteen year old in front and a squealing five year old behind. It took fourteen hours before Bruce was even halfway up the stairs of the shiny building and he had since three hours ago foolishly let the five year old take a nap on his back while they waited for the queue to move. When he finally got to the top of the building he was led into a small cubicle with a tv, it was much like a voting ballot booth but there was no choice in who was going to be elected. It switched on after a minute showing a young man who introduced himself as General Zod. All of it was in Chinese and Bruce despite having learnt it fluently couldn't be bothered with anything that wasn't in his native tongue after twenty eight hours in a line.

He did catch the last sentence of it "So long as you accept the new status quo you shall be able to live in peace." After the announcement he was shown into another room where they took his name and date of birth, he gave false ones and when it came for the picture to be taken Bruce took one look at the camera and bolted for the nearby window. They would have his face on the CCTV camera's in the building but it was easier to wipe a camera system integrated in a building than one that was in a sole camera. He heard the bullets behind him and felt one graze his arm but refused to let it get to him. He managed to get out of the window and onto the ledge that was happily constructed so that he could easily run along to the next window, hang on the ledge and drop to the next. This continued to be the routine of his escape with bullets flying everywhere and some coming closer than he was comfortable with. Fortunately he had received training and the gravity was making them shit shots or Bruce would have been done for.

Once he reached the ground though there were guards there that kept everyone in the lines. They had received communication of Bruce's escape through their walkie talkies and had prepared to cut him off before he could get out of the parking spaces he had landed in. Taking one look at the guns Bruce feinted left sending bullets that way before he dodged low to the ground at the right. He charged the nearest guard and took the gun out of his hands easily with a tackle. The atmosphere made sure he was out as soon as he touched the ground. With a weapon and a guard at his disposal Bruce quickly formulated a plan in the seconds it took the other guards to turn and shoot at him. The guard had tear gas in his belt. With a swipe he pulled the pin and threw it into the guards creating a smoke screen for him. He shot the gun at random ways to further confuse them whilst he made his escape.

The alley ways and streets were unfamiliar in the dawn and with no one around to help him with directions Bruce was at a loss as to where to go. He made sure to run as far as he could from the compound, taking back alleys to begin with before his direction became lost and he climbed to the rooftops. He wandered around unsure as to what to do, he would need a computer first to erase his presence here but before that he needed food and maybe a bath.

The next hotel Bruce came across he scaled the walls until he found a window someone had left open in the panic of the recruitment. The lack of people here made Bruce wonder what happened to the humans after they went in that building. So far he hadn't seen any sign of life except for the stray cat or dog.

Not dwelling too much on it Bruce opened the hotel door and journeyed down the lavish corridors to the kitchen. He silently admitted to himself that he missed this extravagant lifestyle, as he looked upon the art work and the comfy looking sofas. There wasn't room for comfort in the last two years and although it was his choice to leave this lifestyles behind Bruce still yearned for some of the luxuries. Such as a bath or shower any time he wanted and Alfred's cooking. Even just Alfred by himself.

Emotions. Bruce steeled himself and pilchard the kitchen for anything edible before taking his fill and quickly retreating back to the main lobby. It would be wise for him to sleep near an entrance where he could make a quick escape but Bruce couldn't help thinking about the hot water he had imagined came from the penthouse bathroom. It would be easy to break into. Sighing Bruce sacrificed his need for a bath over urgency of escape and went to the gym to take a quick shower and steal some clothes from the hotel's shop. He made sure the front entrance was open before moving one of the sofa's to face the entrance. Situating himself behind it out of sight of any passers by Bruce allowed himself to sleep.

When he woke up he made a check so that no one had found him or returned to the hotel before he allowed himself to go back down to the kitchens for something to eat. His body was even more tired today as the suns presence damaged more of the earth and as he ate he tried to meditate himself into a state that would once again ignore his body's need to shut down so he could function like normal. It took half an hour but it was always worth it to be able to move freely without a dragging need to sit down. Today Bruce decided that he needed to make a plan. The alien would be noted about Bruce's defiance and he needed to be prepared but more than that he needed to find some way to get back to the US. He couldn't stay here as no matter what he did the root of the problem had grown in Smallville and that was where Bruce needed to go to make a difference. Clark needed him there. Alfred needed him.

They had probably stopped all flights due to the cataloguing so the only way back would be to steal a plane or a boat. Ideally a plane since they were faster but he needed to find a way to take out the alien before he felt comfortable flying. Which brought him back to his original problem, how to defeat them.

Bruce set to the rooftops again to make headway to the airport. On foot it would take probably two days since he needed to steal a map first. So Bruce went stealing, he tried the first couple of houses for maps or phones but it seemed that they had no need to keep their travel items in the house and most likely took their phones with them. He got lucky in the seventh house where a young girl must have forgotten her phone in her room during the chaos. He made sure it was charged before pulling up the GPS and setting himself on the course to the still stuck to the rooftops but made sure that he stayed within the streets view so that he didn't get lost.

Why was the sun red? He guessed that this must have been the environment of Clark's native planet so why weren't the alien's helpless. Clarks powers were the result of a lighter atmosphere so how do the others differ. Unless. Unless they aren't actually from Clarks planet, not really anyway so in order for them to have the same powers of Clark they needed their own atmosphere, the complete opposite of what Clark needs. It would make sense since they appear to have taken hold of earth's technology and ways rather quickly so they must have been here a while and since there was no mention of them before they must have been powerless. Therefore they must have a device that turns the sun red that was built on earth, if they destroyed it then the sun would turn yellow again and they would be as powerless as a human.

That was it, he needed to find a way to create a yellow sun, it would subdue the alien enough so that he could kill it. But how? Bruce ran through a list of materials in his head that could possibly generate a simulated yellow sun. Then thought himself stupid when he realised that there were such things as UV lights.

"Just like killing a vampire." He muttered before following the arrow on the phone.

He stopped at a lovely person's home that night. They weren't in but the fridge was stocked and the guest room was comfy, not to mention they had running water warm enough for a bath. If Bruce indulged his weary self in it that was entirely a reward for all the hard work he had done. Besides he did some scheming while he was soaking and formulated a plan. The airport would have UV lights so they could search people and all he had to do was maybe break some of them into a smaller and portable object that would keep off meddling aliens while he was in the air.

Thinking about aliens had him wondering how Clark was doing. The adjustment from almighty God to pathetic mortal would be hard for him he wouldn't be used to bleeding or being hurt. There was one added benefit though and Bruce wondered if Clark was taking advantage of touching things, anything from a metal pipe to writing on paper. He hoped he was but then thought about who he could be taking advantage of that benefit with. Most likely Lana. Bruce scowled when thinking of her, he could say now he was older that he may have been slightly jealous of her when he visited, but he couldn't understand how a girl like her could enamour all of Clarks attention like that. To say that Bruce had no one in his travels would be an understatement. He was seventeen and wanted no one so it was easy for him to take advantage of girls with a bit of flirting. But that was all it was, he hadn't actually done anything since he had last seen Clark but he knew that Clark had done things since he had last seen Bruce.

It bothered him a little that Clark was deluding himself with Lana, he knew that him and Clark had a future together and with the confusion Lana and others might have put Clark through Bruce only hoped that he could make Clark see that too.

He removed himself from the bath after that, the relaxation was making him think stupidly. Bruce took a quick tour of the house and checked the exits and entrances so they were locked tight. When he got to one of the children's bedrooms though he paused. Discarded on the floor was one of the child's dress ups it was a cat costume complete with a cowl. It was obviously a cat but in the darkness when he was checking the window he could have sworn that the ears were longer, thinner almost like a bats and he took a fright.

Now he thought himself stupid for even thinking it looked like one but it brought back the memories of when he was younger and bats were the scariest thing he could ever encounter. The fact that a mask could invoke such terror in him made him remember the promise he had made himself, he was going to conquer all fears and all manners of the night and darkness so he could make things better. Bats were a fear that still made him hesitate before he strove on.

"So how do I solve it?"

The answer didn't come until the next day as he was passing a fancy dress shop, there in the window much like the cat mask was a cowl but this time the ears were elongated and nose pointed into the shape of a bat. If he couldn't conquer fear then he should become it. He quickly broke into the shop and took the mask reassuring himself that it was to protect his identity as well as help his repressed childhood fear. It would enable him to remain faceless as he went back to America. Bruce Wayne had died two and a half years ago when he disappeared from Princeton and it wouldn't do for a ghost to come back in this time of crisis. He was preventing the reprieve humans would latch onto if only to ignore the truth of their new lords as well as help Alfred. He had lost so much that to give himself back to him only to take him away as he went to Smallville would surely be the end of him.

Bruce had reached the airport now and quickly donned his mask. It too was deserted with not even the sounds of planes overhead. Bruce only allowed a minute of stunned silence before he ran to the check in points, the UV lights would be in the security office and he needed them soon. He quickly grabbed them and was glad to see that they were easy enough to carry. His next job now that he had them was to find a plane. All of the ones in the airport were too big he needed a private plane. He quickly booted up the computer in the security office and hacked into the system to discover where the ideal plane was. He shopped for ten minutes before selecting the one in terminal B.

Rushing over to it he silently amused himself with the fact that this was the quickest he had ever boarded a plane in his life before he checked for fuel enough to get him there and that the plane was actually functioning. Bruce thanked his father and later Master over in Germany for teaching him how to fly a plane and set own the UV lights in the co pilots chair before lifting off.

He was three hours into his journey before he realised that the blinking light meant a flying object was approaching. Soon enough the doors behind him burst open and the alien from three days ago stormed onto the plane.

"I never thought humans could be so stupid." He said to himself and proceeded to advance towards Bruce.

Having the thought to put it on auto Bruce lunged towards the UV lights and turned them on just as the alien drew his hand back to strike at Bruce. The glare of the light startled him and for a moment Bruce thought that he had been wrong and that he was actually going to die. Then the alien stumbled. The hand that was raised came down as he moved back and he looked confusedly around for why his powers were gone. Under the glare his skin began to get sickly and sweaty as the red suns atmosphere started to get at him. He wasn't powerful under any sun so long as the UV light was on him. Bruce set it down on the table in the passenger part of the plane and crept behind him. In the aliens confusion he didn't notice Bruce until he had struck him from behind. The alien crumbled but he also fell out of the line of the light. His strength returned and with that his quick thinking. He gathered that the light was the reason for his loss of power and made sure to steer clear of it as Bruce viciously attacked him. The alien was arrogant though in his new powers and wasn't prepared for the shock tactics Bruce was applying. Any being that was powerful like that could still be a victim to shock so Bruce used surprise and speed to move the alien.

He suffered more blows than he landed though and he was pretty sure that his arm was sprained if not broken but he still carried on. They fought on until Bruce was spitting blood from his mouth as he knelt on the floor. The alien seemed to grow tired of their match and his eyes turned red with the building of heat. Unfortunately for the alien he didn't notice that Bruce had positioned himself on the same side as the UV light and as he flung a ripped up seatbelt from the aliens earlier fit at his eyes he lunged for the light.

Bruce shone it on the alien and the heat dissipated from his eyes while he once again grew weary. Bruce took advantage of it and kicked him down to his knees before placing it on another passenger seat so it faced the alien and restrained it from moving. Once he had over powered him he mover him securely in the line of the light before taking hold of his head and snapping his neck.

Bruce lay panting just feet from where the dead alien was. The shock of what he had done ruling his mind. He always thought the first man he would kill would be his parents murderer. Yet here he was on a plane with his first body. Bruce was shaking and on the verge of tears, the alien had taken that away from him. He had taken the dream that had kept Bruce going so Bruce vowed that he would destroy theirs. They wanted the earth? Bruce was going to make sure they wished they had never landed on it.

He gathered himself up from the floor and turned the UV light off bringing it back to the co pilots chair with him before correcting his course and hoping that more aliens would try and get him out of the sky. He was ready for them and all the ones that had invaded his planet.


End file.
